Things Are Rarely as They Seem
by Singed the Mad Chemist
Summary: As their ship is under attack, Soundwave and Airachnid are forced to defend themselves, Shockwave, and the mysterious artifact in their possession, as the Autobot forces arrive, soon driving them to desperate measures. When the Autobots gain the full advantage, and the Decepticons are fought to the last bot, everything starts slipping like water through their hands...


"Soundwave, either something's wrong with your processor, or you're mad!" Airachnid shouted, as she frantically tried to keep up with the skinny, white-red-and-blue bot ahead of her, as they ran through the small, long corridors of the small, sloop-like ship they were on. They finally stopped by a closed door at the end of the hallway, and Soundwave proceeded to the computer on the door's side.

"We both know it's the only way to keep the device out of the Autobot's servos" Soundwave said in his deep, guttural voice, as he typed the passcode into the door's computer.

"But... I don't want to go offline yet! I still haven't found... _The one_" she spoke again, staring elsewhere dreamily.

"Will you shut up about that childish scrap fantasy of yours, and keep your mind focussed on what matters! On reality!" Soundwave bellowed, snapping the white-and-pink fem out of her thoughts, as the door finally slid open.

The second the door vertically opened, a roaring boom, followed by a powerful tremor, echoed throughout the ship, sending both Soundwave and Airachnid stumbling around, trying to hold their balance.

"They just boarded. We don't have time to discuss this anymore" Soundwave spoke once the shaking subsided, turning his yellow, screen-like face to his ally. "We're as good as deactivated either way."

After looking away for a second, Airachnid looked back to Soundwave and nodded. They both headed into the room, and in the corner of it, Airachnid could see Shockwave, his red and steel body turned to them. In front of him was the artifact: A glowing, blue sphere with multiple, ancient symbols on it.

"Shockwave, is the artifact set to self destruct yet?" Soundwave asked, as he turned and closed the door behind both Airachnid and himself once they entered the room.

"I've done as much as the instructions could show, but I have a feeling that if I keep working on it just a few minutes more, I could have every secret unlocked, and the information sent to Decepticon high command for replication" the one-eyed bot replied, his utensils poking, prodding, and moving about the top of the glowing sphere.

"You'd better move it then, the Autobots just boarded" Soundwave warned.

"I know. Lord Starscream just informed me he was going to attempt to distract them as long as he could for me."

As soon as he finished speaking, a red light on the side of his arm began to beep and shine a red light, prompting Shockwave to look down at it with a rapid jerk of his head, as if in surprise and concern.

"Shockwave... What does that beeping red light mean?" Soundwave asked, dread clearly evident in his voice.

"Lord Starscream's life signal... His life signal just... Went offline" he spoke in a saddened, pained voice, before returning to his work on the spherical object with great reluctance.

"Primus... Primus damn it!" Soundwave roared in anger, slamming his fist into the nearby wall, creating a large dent in it, as Airachnid held a servo to her mouth, her expression resembling one of great shock, evident on how wide open her blue optics were.

"No... No..." She finally gasped. "B-but... He's done this kind of thing so many times... I-I thought he was invincible."

"He said he was going to distract them as long as he could... He did what he said. We can't let his sacrifice be in vain" Soundwave said, placing his servo on the fem's shoulder in comfort.

As she looked to him with an unsure look in her blue optics, and a frowned mouth, a loud bang came from the doorway. They both immediately looked toward it.

"Hit harder!" a feminine voice said from the other side of it. Another pounding noise hit the door, and a servo broke through the crack of it, followed by another, and both began peeling both doors back.

Stopping halfway through, the figure took both his hands out, and peered in. All Airachnid and Soundwave could see, though, were two, red optics on a shadowed face.

"Catch" the figure on the other side of the door said, tossing a cylinder-shaped object though the opening he created. It landed on the ground, and rolled like a stone until it came a few meters from Airachnid and Soundwave's feet.

It was a bomb.

Soundwave noticed it right off, watching as the green symbols on the grenade's side turned red, and beeped rapidly, but when he turned his view to Airachnid, he saw her face and body were frozen in terror.

"Airachnid, get down!" Soundwave shouted, running up to tackle her out of harm's way.

The bomb went off in an explosion of shrapnel and force before he could even get near her, throwing them both back.

Soundwave landed on the ground in a roll, until he stopped near where Shockwave was, while Airachnid was thrown like a ragdoll into the nearby wall, where she bounced off of it, and landed a fair point off from it, smoke from the bomb enveloping her.

After her daze went away, Airachnid sat up with a pained cough, and opened her optics uneasily, looking around. She started to make out two figures in the smoke as it cleared, their red eyes piercing through it.

The first one was a medium-sized bot, around Soundwave's size in terms of height, but much bulkier in terms of width. He had two horns sticking out of both sides of his head, and he had a purple paint job, along with a purple Autobot symbol on his chest, highlighted in black.

The feminine figure clad in purple-outlined, black, and steel-painted armor that was standing next to him, however, Airachnid recognized right off. Her spark nearly went out in horror when the figure's eyes met hers, and a Cheshire grin slowly appeared on the figure's face.

"Tailgate, you get Soundwave and Shockwave... I'm going to spend some time with the spider" the fem's voice said, as she turned to her partner's face, before returning her malevolent gaze back to Airachnid.

The bot, as Airachnid could now see was Tailgate, looked quickly to Airachnid with a smile, and then back to his ally with a nod, before he cracked his knuckles, and began walking in Soundwave's direction.

"Hello, Airachnid..." The fem said in a tone of queer joy, her face still curled into a twisted smile, and her two, red optics focussed on her white-and-pink quarry, as she slowly walked up to her.

"Ar-Ar-Arcee?" Airachnid stuttered, shuffling backwards on the ground until she reached the wall of the room. She placed her servos on it, and quickly pulled herself up before the Autobot. Fear was clearly evident in her blue optics, as they jerked left and right, looking for a way of escape.

Without warning, Arcee jumped forward with a cry, sending her fist toward Airachnid. With a squeak of fear, she avoided it by sliding down to her left, and scrambled away when her attacker's fist slammed into the wall, and got stuck in it.

"I've been waiting so long for this moment..." Arcee said, as she pulled her fist out of the hole she created, and faced Airachnid again, her arm blades extending, someone else's energon still freshly coated on their edges. "Nobody left to hide behind, nowhere left to run, it's just you, me, and my blades."

She rushed forward, and before Airachnid could even think of dodging, she was slashed at in the chest, sending sparks flying as she yelled out in pain.

Soundwave, now standing up, watched as Arcee attacked Airachnid, then looked forward as Tailgate approached him.

"Long time, no see, Soundwave" Tailgate said, as he slammed his two fists together.

Soundwave clenched his fist, and got into a combative position, ready to attack.

"Today is a great victory for the Autobots" he spoke again. "Starscream is dead as a doornail, leaving the Decepticons, once again, leaderless. When will any of you learn you can't stand against Prime?"

"As long as there's still one Decepticon standing, we will never stop our quest to end your oppression!" Soundwave roared, defiantly, as he charged forward.

Behind them as they fought, Airachnid jumped back and forth in her attempt to dodge Arcee's many, deadly swipes from her arm blades, the deranged fem's attacks becoming more swift and erratic the further their battle went on.

"You're nothing but a sick freak, Arcee" Airachnid spoke as she blocked one of Arcee's arms with her multiple appendages, finally summing up the courage to speak to her adversary.

"And you're about to get your head mounted on my wall" Arcee replied in a demented snigger, continuing her assault.

After pushing her away, Airachnid jumped back, and onto her spider legs as they distended, while her normal ones transformed and turned into something resembling a spider's abdomen.

Using her spider legs, Airachnid moved away from Arcee, her agility now greater than the Autobot's.

"Hold still, you prancy little insect!" Arcee growled in frustration. "I can't extinguish your spark if you keep jumping around like this!"

"You must be dumber than you look to think I'm going to do that" Airachnid insulted, as she moved about. "But, then again, that wouldn't really come as a surprise."

Arcee, now with an expression of pure lividness, got ready to lunge at her adversary. Before she could however, a blast of webbing from Airachnid's servos flew into her hand, trapping it on the wall just behind her. As she turned to try and free it, another stand of the substance coated her other hand, attaching it to the wall as well, followed by several more shots, each one hitting her arms and torso, pinning her.

Airachnid ran up to her and glared at her with her with a vengeful expression.

"You're lucky I'm not like you" she spoke, pointing a finger at Arcee, trying to sound as intimidating as she could. Arcee only let out a crazed laugh.

"And that's why you're going to lose in the end" she hissed in reply. "That's why we're going to win, and that's why I'm going to extinguish your spark, in as-"

Arcee was cut off in her sentence as one more strand of webbing shot off from Airachnid, and covered her mouth.

"That's better" Ariachnid said again, a smile of satisfaction on her blue lips, as Arcee let out angered, muffled insults from behind the webbing around her mouth.

Turning, she began to run up to where Soundwave was, unaware of Arcee's arm blade extending, and already starting to cut at her bindings...

"Soundwave, do you need help?" She asked, running up to her friend.

"I've got him" he grunted in reply, parrying a blow with his arm, while simultaneously motioning for her to stay back. "I need you to try and seal up those doors before anybody else can get here. Do you understand?"

"Got it" she answered, running up to the peeled-open door without a second thought.

As she started to cast her webbing onto, and around the split-open doors, Tailgate continued his attack on Soundwave.

After withstanding another blow from Tailgate, Soundwave kicked him in the leg, and jumped back.

"Ravage, Laserbeak, attack!" He shouted. As soon as he yelled his command, the red armor on his chest flew off, taking to the air, and flying behind Tailgate, and the pack-like device on his back transformed into a cat-like creature, and jumped off.

"Time R 2 fight!" The white-and-blue, yellow-eyed Ravage shouted, bounding to the left of Tailgate, as Laserbeak flew overhead.

Grimacing at his two new, Minicon opponents, Tailgate braced himself against oncoming fire from Laserbeak.

"GetBak2TrainingFacility, noob!" Ravage roared, the duel blasters on both his sides pelting Tailgate with large amounts of energy, each hit against his purple armor feeling like the sting of a Scraplet's bite. Another shot to the face from Laserbeak sent the purple mech spiraling.

Before the bewildered Autobot realized what was happening, he flung himself forward... And opened his eyes in shock as a swift pain hit his chest.

Coughing up energon, he looked down, and saw Soundwave's arm sticking out of his chest, energon heavily leaking from the wound.

"Pwned" Ravage spoke, when he saw Tailgate desperately clutch at Soundwave's arm, his face full of hatred at his killer.

"To take down someone as powerful, honorable, and brave as Lord Starscream... I guess you _could _call that a great victory. Choke on it" Soundwave spoke in a cold voice.

He watched from behind his yellow screen-like face as the life left Tailgate's eyes, until Laserbeak let out an electronic screech of warning, prompting the Decepticon to turn his head. He saw Arcee, having finally freed herself, charging him, both of her blades out, ready to slice him up.

Thinking fast, he chucked his enemy's body, in a stumbling fashion, toward the charging Arcee, slumping into her arms, stopping her dead in her tracks.

"Get off me!" Arcee shouted in an annoyed tone, carelessly throwing the lifeless husk of her former partner off herself, and crashing to the ground, before returning her attention back to Soundwave, who swiped his servo at her.

She dodged it with a jump to the left, and struck at him in the stomach with a backwards kick. As Soundwave bent over in reaction, Arcee turned and elbowed him directly in the center of his face, shattering the glass of his yellow visor, and sending him back, reeling in pain as energon leaked from the cracks of his broken facial plating.

The sound of blaster fire alerted Arcee to Soundwave's minions attacking. Avoiding the shots, she watched Laserbeak approach her as he fired upon her.

With a jump and a slash, she hit Laserbeak in his wing as the bot flew by, sending the drone rocketing into a wall, before smashing to the ground on its back, making all sorts of squeaking noises at its helplessness as it tried to vainly righten itself back up again.

A barrage of fire from Ravage made Arcee turn her attention to the other Minicon.

Getting into a better position, her servos transformed into her two blasters, and she fired at Ravage, each shot hitting its mark. Ravage let out a yowl of pain, and stumbled about, as he looked at his wounds.

"Hashtag... Oh noes..." Was all the Minicon could say, before he succumbed to the blaster fire, and fell to his side with a moan.

Soundwave, blinded by his broken visor and the energon leaking from his face, could only swipe his arms blindly at Arcee, who avoided his attacks with ease, getting several damaging strikes of her own on him.

A final slash at his knee brought him down, and she kneed him in the neck, sending him, back-fist, to the ground.

"Optimus is going to love this!" Arcee said with sadistic glee, as she pressed the front of her foot down on Soundwave's face, breaking more pieces of glass on his visor, and prompting the moaning Decepticon to claw, uselessly, at her leg. "First, I kill the Decepticon's head communications officer, then I'll kill the Decepticon's head scientist. I'd say this was a good day for me."

Her servo transformed into a blaster, and took aim at Soundwave's spark chamber.

"Nothing too personal Soundwave, I just enjoy doing this" she said as her crooked grin returned to her face.

"No!" Airachnid's voice went out, as her figure suddenly tackled Arcee, sending her aim off the second she unleashed a round from her blaster, hitting the ground instead of her intended target.

"Let... Go!" Arcee roared, as Airachnid held her arms around Arcee's neck, hanging on for dear life.

"Never!" Airachnid said again, well knowing that letting up even the slightest would be the death of her. Her legs extended again, and she lifted both Arcee and herself off the ground.

"Shockwave..." Soundwave moaned, as he shifted to the wall, and tried to stand up.

"I've almost got it! I've almost got it!" The one-eyed scientist said, still in the corner of the room, tampering, furiously, with the spherical artifact.

As soon as he prodded the top of the sphere again, the object's tip suddenly morphed, and separated into four corners, revealing a green, glowing orb of energy that seemed to lift out of the sphere, and up to eye level, flashing repeatedly.

"What in Cybertron..." He gasped, as the frequency of the orb's flashes increased, until it was a solid, blinding glow.

In the frenzy of events happening behind him, Arcee pointed the barrel of her blaster up, and fired it, nicking the top of Airachnid's helmeted head when a red beam of energy blasted out, prompting her to let go of Arcee in a surprised reaction.

Wasting no time, she turned around, and leapt at Airachnid, sending them both rolling along the ground, with Arcee clawing and pounding at her foe like a rabid, caged animal.

While this was happening, Soundwave was limping to his fallen Minicon allies, slowly taking off the broken glass from his visor that obscured his vision while doing so, exposing all but the optics of his silver-colored face as the glass fell to the floor in a pile.

"Ravage..." He said, once he approached the cat-like one.

"Oh, hai..." Ravage mumbled, weakly opening his yellow optics, his innocent smile still glued to his face. He rolled over, and morphed into the pack-like device he once was, and magnetically flew onto Soundwave's back.

"Laserbeak" he said next, as he shuffled up to the red, fallen drone, which was continuing its panicked movements and noise.

As soon as he picked up his friend, Laserbeak morphed, and landed on Soundwave's chest, connecting with him.

Turning, he looked at Arcee and Airachnid as they brawled, rolling across the ground in their fight.

Before he could intervene, he fell to one knee, too weak to even move. He trembled as he looked back up, angered by his inability to help his comrade.

"Airachnid... No..." He said in a whisper, as his breath became weaker.

Airachnid, having been unable to defend herself from Arcee's superior training and ruthlessness, and having had nowhere to run, found herself pinned to the ground by her attacker, thoroughly beaten. She tried to wriggle her head, but the tip of Arcee's blaster connecting to it straightened it out, causing her to look into her enemy's red eyes with great fear.

"It's been a trip, Airachnid" Arcee growled, licking her purple lips, as the barrel of he blaster began to glow red. "But all good things must come to an end. Like _you, _for example..."

All Airachnid could do was close her optics, and prepare for her imminent demise.

A bright green flash suddenly brought Arcee's attention off her prey, as she shielded her eyes. Looking up, she saw the now large, glowing, pulsating orb floating in front of Shockwave, who himself appeared awestruck, or even dumbstruck by what he was seeing.

"What th-" Was all Arcee could say, before the orb pulsated again, and enveloped everyone in the room in its blinding glow.

A moment later, everything went still.

* * *

"It's open!" One of the Autobot soldiers shouted, as he and two others cut the last of the webbing around the door, letting them in. Behind them, their silver-armored band leader, Smokescreen, entered as well, his red optics scanning the room, but finding nothing.

The four of them looked through the room, but there was no sign of anybody, or anything, save for a small puddle of energon, and signs of a scuffle.

"What in the Pit happened here?" One soldier asked, as he looked around on the ground for anything.

"Keep looking, this has to be a trick of some sort!" Smokescreen said, as he continued to walk around. He stopped the second he heard the sound of something solid cracking underneath his heel.

Lifting his foot up, at first Smokescreen saw nothing, but then he noticed dozens of pieces of small, yellow, solid objects with sharp edges. Curious, he knelt down and cupped the multiple pieces of what was left of Soundwave's visor into his servo, lifted it, and let them pour out, back to the ground.

Shattered glass.

* * *

**Author's notes:** Hey, Steve here! Sorry if I confused any of you guys with this midquel, but I really, really wanted to write this down while the idea was fresh in my head. I'm planning on having this story lead into my sequel for the current story I'm writing, and speaking of which, I'm getting right back to writing it, so have no fear! _The Darkness Always Wins_ will have its next chapter put up in a jiffy! See ya guys then!

Oh, and in case anybody wanted to ask, this entire story took place in the _Prime _version of the shattered glass universe, hence why they're all colored differently, and why Soundwave talked, Airachnid was battle-shy, Arcee was PURE EVIL, why they said Starscream was brave, etc...


End file.
